Nails for Breakfast, Tacks for Snacks
by BlyMrtn-RiotGrl
Summary: Basically, it's all about Craig with a few new characters added. It starts in what would be season 2 where he lives with his abusive father.
1. Chapter 1

**PART ONE**

What the hell..." Thought Craig Manning as he walked through the streets after school, dragging his feet, reluctant to return home. He leaned against a fence and closed his eyes. School may have been over, but the day was just beginning for him. Craig dawdled as long as he possibly could, and decided that he couldn't wait anymore. It was about an hour after school ended, and he was about fifteen minutes away from home. As he walked along, he heard loud guitar music coming from somewhere on the street. Looking around, he realized that the music was coming from a small shop on the corner with a neon sign glowing "open" in the window.

Craig pushed the door opened, and the bells on the top of the door jingled. He paused and looked around, he could have sworn he was in heaven. Guitars of all brands, colors, styles, and sizes crowded the walls to bursting point, and there were stacks and stacks of books and cases and cleaning supplies. Suddenly someone playing the beginning to the Simple Plan song 'perfect' shocked him back to reality.

He looked over at the counter where a girl was sitting on top, holding a Fender guitar. She had long dark hair with blue tips and strikingly green eyes. Her Converse Chuck Taylor sneakers were only laced halfway, and her jeans were covered in rips and patches of different bands, and she wore a black collared uniform shirt that read "Billy's Guitar Shop" in red stitching on the right side with a name tag underneath that read 'Alicia'. Hearing someone approach, she looked up and made eye contact with him, causing him to blush.

"Hi there, is there anything I can help you with?" She asked sweetly, gently placing the guitar on the counter, as if it were a child she didn't want to injure. Alicia smiled at him. Craig stood there stupidly, trying to come up with something to say to her and finally thought of what sounded in his head to be smooth.

"Yeah." He responded, glancing behind the counter. "I'll have a bag of medium pics in blue, a package of Elixer strings, a pack of AA batteries for my tuner, and your phone number." It wasn't until after he said it that he realized how desperate he must have sounded, and blushed again. Alicia didn't make any signs that she had opposed, or even heard what he said, and she jumped down off the counter and looked over the racks and found the things he ordered.

"Okay...so the total comes to...50." She said.

"Wait...what? I didn't order anything that expensive." He frowned and took out his wallet.

"Well, it was 15 or the strings, 7 for the pics, 8 for the batteries, and 20 for my number." She smiled at him, making him smile also. He handed her the correct amount of money and she gave him his change back. Taking a lime green sharpie from her pocket she wrote her number on his hand. "Call me any time from after school to before 10:00. Anytime is fine on weekends. It's my cell. I didn't catch your name by the way."

"Craig." He responded with a smile. "You didn't even ask earlier, you gave your number to a complete stranger." Craig smirked at her.

"What can I see, I couldn't think straight talking to someone as adorable as you." Alicia responded, Craig dropped his bag by accident, feeling pretty stupid. "And I'm Alicia by the way, in case you can't read." She said pointing to her name tag.

"I'd love to stay and talk, but I have to leave and get home before my dad..." He trailed off, almost revealing his um...at home..complications. She raised a pierced eyebrow and looked at him. "Freaks out. I was supposed to do the dishes..."

"Oh, well it was nice talking to you, and I'll be expecting your call." He smiled at her and left, the bells jingling again. This time, he didn't amble along, he ran as fast as he could so that he wouldn't be in too much trouble. Hurling himself onto his front steps and through the door, he rested and breathed heavily. He didn't see his dad, maybe he had beat him home. That would have been nice...glancing around he concluded that his father wasn't there and walked into the kitchen to get a snack. He opened the fridge to find something to eat and to his horror heard his father's voice say behind him "You're late."


	2. Chapter 2

**PART TWO**

"I'm sorry dad, I had to pick some stuff up after school." Craig responded.

"Didn't I tell you to come home right away?" His dad said angrilly.

"I came home as soon as I could." Craig said, shortly before feeling a hit in the chest and falling backward into the shelves of the open fridge, a jug of juice pouring down over his head. Slowly, Craig pushed himself up, only to be knocked back down to the floor. After what seemed live forever, his father finally walked away to go watch TV. Gingerly, Craig pushed himself up and tiptoed upstairs and went into his room, closing and locking the door behind him. He held back tears, he could tell that that first blow was going to bruise. Leaving for the bathroom, he quickly showered, washing the sticky Kool-Aid from his hair.

He layed down on the bed and stared at the ceiling, and went to go wipe his watery eyes when he noticed Alicia's number on his hand. Craig smiled, at least he had something to look foward to. Taking out a piece of paper he copied the number and tacked it to a small bulletin board on his wall. For a minute or two he shifted through his drawer and found his headphones. Placing them over his ears, he drowned out the world in music.


	3. Chapter 3

**PART THREE**

"Hey Jimmy!" Craig said in the hallway at school the next day, seeing his friend leaning against a locker talking to his girlfriend Andrea. Andrea was laughing at something or other, her brown hair falling in her face as she bent over. She stood back up seeing Craig and shouted a hello. As usual, Andrea was dressed in jeans and some form of Rent t-shirt, her favorite movie/musical.

"What's up man?" Jimmy asked, putting an arm around Andrea, who leaned her head on his shoulder.

"Nothing much..." Craig said, scratching the side of his nose suddenly.

"Ooh, is that a phone number Craig?" Andrea asked, glad to see that someone was interested in Craig.

"Yeah. It's this girl Alicia that I met yesterday at "Billy's Guitar Shop". He said with a smile.

"Niiiceee." Jimmy responded, closing his locker.

"Leash?" Andrea asked. "I've known her since the first grade."

"Really?" Craig asked in shock.

"Yeah. She's cool. We should all hang out sometime."

"How come I've never seen her before?"

"She moved for a while...complications with her parent's divorce, her and her dad just moved back to the area." The bell rang and they said godbye and Craig walked to his History class and sat down next to his friend Sean. They talked for a few minutes until their teacher came in and the lesson started. Craig yawned and looked around the room nearly falling alseep. He heard the teacher ask a question and someone answered.

"But if he believed that you were born with your fate decided that you should go to Heaven, and only a selected few were chosen, then why would people bother trying to be good?" A girl responded.

"Because, one of the chosen few would never even dream of doing something bad." Craig snapped out of his sleepy state and looked back, recognizing that voice. Alicia was sitting in the back of the room next to Ellie taking notes, while passing a note back and forth. He smiled and got her attention mouthing "hi." She smiled back, biting her lip, and mouthed "hey."

After the class ended, Alicia and Ellie left together, walking down the hallway and dissappearing.

"You have it bad for that chick." Sean said with a smirk, lightly punching Craig on the shoulder.

"I do not!" Craig said, he could feel himself looking guilty.

"Ahhh yes you do. She's pretty cute..not as cute as my Ellie of course." Sean added, slinging his bag over his shoulder.

"She gave me her number yesterday." Craig said, feeling really cool all of a sudden.

"Call her." Sean said, and he left to go to auto.


	4. Chapter 4

**PART FOUR**

"Heads up! Look out! Craig!" yelled someone in the distance but, no luck. The basketball collided with the side of Craig's head nearly knocking him over. Spinner came running from the basketball court to retrieve the ball.

"Sorry about that. I tried to warn you." Spinner said, trying not to laugh.

"No problem." Craig responded, rubbing the side of his face. "It only stings a little..."

"Aww...poor Cwaiggg...does it huwt?" Spinner joked, stroking Craig's face.

"Shut up!" Laughed Craig, pushing Spinner slightly.

"Come join our game."

"Sure." Craig walked over to the basketball court with Spinner where Jimmy and Marco were waiting.

"Wait...what is _he_ doing here?" Spinner asked, seeing Marco and backing up slightly.

"Oh get over it Spinner. How many times do I have to tell you that you aren't my type? I'm starting to think that you WANT me to hit on you or something." Marco said, rolling his eyes. He took the ball from Craig and started bouncing it. Jimmy laughed, and looked at Spinner.

"It's okay Spinner, you can some out of the closet anytime you want, we won't judge you." He said.

"That's not funny!" Spinner muttered, charging at Jimmy, knocking him over.

"Calm down..." Craig said, pulling him up off of the ground.

"I need to be...somewhere...else." Marco said, walking away from them and leaving. Craig sighed, lately Spinner always managed to make Marco miserable. Ever since he had come out as gay Spinner had been paranoid that Marco was going to be attracted to him. After playing basketball for a while Craig sat down on the bleachers to catch his breath.

"Oh crap. What time is it?" Craig asked, standing up.

"It's around 3:30."

"Damn...I'll catch you guys later." He said, grabbing his bag and walking away. Hearing laughter he saw Andrea, Alicia, and Ellie walk out of the building. Smiling, he went to wave at them but they got into a blue convertable and drove away. Sighing, he started walking home so he could get there before his dad managed to. Sean walked up next to him and started walking beside him.

"So...are you gonna call her?"

"I wish..."

"Why not?"

"I don't want to push my luck."

"She _gave_ you the number. She wants you to call."

"Andrea and Jimmy want to double with us. We aren't even on the level of friends yet, nevermind anything else...whatever. I gotta run though. Beat Dad home." Before Sean could say anything else, he jogged away to his house and to his relief, arrived before his father.


	5. Chapter 5

**PART FIVE**

Craig sank against the frame of the door catching his breath and automatically ran up the stairs to his room. Yawning he took off his trademark leather jacket and sat on the edge of the bed, staring at the door. His father must have gotten tied up at the hospital which Craig obviously did not mind. Sitting and pondering what to do for a moment, he stood up and picked his guitar up from it's spot on the floor and plugged it into his amp, beginning to play. After a few moments he was lost in the music, stopping only to scribble a few lyrics down into his notebook. He did not even hear the sound of the car pulling into the driveway.

About five minutes later angry footsteeps sounded in the hallway and Craig stopped playing, staring in horror at the closed wooden door as if it would spring to life and attack him. Of course, it was not the door that he was worried about. A bead of sweat formed on Craig's forhead, he knew that there was nothing he could do. His father more than likely had a bad day at work, and Craig was a human punching bag. A few moments later Albert came bursting through, an angry look on his face.

"Have you finished your homework?" Albert said, glaring at Craig through the black rims of his glasses.

"I was going to start in a little while...I had some inspiration for a good song and I wanted to take it down before I forgot it." Craig said, swallowing spit, hoping that the lump in his throat would go away.

"A song? Oh, wonderful. You really think that music will get you through life?" Albert spat, yanking the guitar from Craig's sweaty fingers. "You know your marks are the most important thing!" Craig pleaded an apology to his father before feeling solid wood colide with his ribs, knocking the wind out of him. Tears filled his eyes as he heard the sickening crack of the neck of his guitar as it made contact with his pre-bruised side.

"I'll do it now..." Craig choked trying to regain breath.

"I know you will." Albert said, calming down, he picked up Craig's backpack and handed it to him. "Make me proud son." He added before disappearing through the door leaving a stunned Craig behind. Hours went by and finally Craig finished his homework with a final algebra equation. Laying down on the bed, he determined that homework should be illegal due to the risk of wrist injuries and headaches. Throwing his pencil at the ceiling so it stuck out at an odd angle, Craig rolled over and picked up his black cordless phone, staring at the face stupidly. _Hmm...to call, or not to call..._he thought, fingering the buttons.

Taking a deep breath, finally he just looked at his hand and dialed Alicia's number. One ring...he was feeling nervous...two rings...what would he say? Three rings..."Hello?" _Wait, what? _He thought to himself.

"Uh...what? I mean, Craig, I mean, shit, hi." He said stupidly, slapping himself.

"Er...hello...is this Craig?"

"Yeah...hi...I called...what's up?"

"Ha ha...nothing. I'm just hanging out with Andrea and Ellie.

"Oh. Nice, Ellie is dating my friend Sean."

"Yeah, I know, Ellie told me. I think they are an adorable couple."

"Sure. Of course."

"So...what's up with you?" Suddenly, Craig had a flashback of the day's happening since he arrived home and turned pale white.

"Um...Just finished my homework. But anyway, what are you doing tomorrow?"

"Working until six, then nothing, why?"

"I was actually...wondering...if um...you would like to do something with me."

"Sure!"

"Really? I mean, that's cool." He slapped himself again.

"Do you drive?" She asked.

"No."

"That's okay then, I'll pick you up after work. Where do you live?" Craig got nervous, he did not want her around his dad, he was not sure how that would go.

"I'll just come by Billy's and we'll go from there."

"Okay cool. I'll see you tommorrow."

"Yep!"

"Buh-bye."

"Bye." _Click! _Sounded the hangup and Craig bit his lip and smiled. For once, he could go to sleep actually hoping that he would wake


	6. Chapter 6

**Part Six**

Leaves crunched under Craig's feet as he walked to the school. It was earlier than he would normally leave but for some reason he felt well rested and decided to go to school a little early. He arrived at the school and went into the cafeteria to buy a breakfast burrito and saw that Jimmy and Andrea were already there and seated. After making a few lunch lady jokes at Spinner who stood behind the counter serving food with a stupid hair net over his blondish head, he sat down with them. Andrea was smiley as usual, scrolling through pop songs on her Ipod.

"How can you listen to that crap?" Jimmy said laughing at Andrea as she selected the new Justin Timberlake song.

"It's a good song!" She said in defense, putting one of her ear buds into his ear. Jimmy looked pained as she turned up the volume. Craig just shook his head and took a bite of the burrito. "Me and Alicia were dancing to it in my living room before."

"She listens to that stuff?" Craig said with a mouthful of food.

"Not usually. She likes things that she can dance to though." Andrea said, switching the song. She could never keep one song on for too long, a trait which Alicia had inherited from years of friendship with Andrea. Craig smiled, _So she dances, _he thought. "We did school talent shows together in elementary school. She sang some stupid Aaron Carter song while a bunch of us danced in the background." Andrea said with a laugh, remembering good times. Craig stood up and left the table, walking to the computer room where Ashley was editing some music.

"Hey you." She said to him smiling, her short jet black hair spiked up as usual.

"Hey Ash." He said standing behind her and leaning over to see the screen.

"What are you working on?" He asked her, watching the sound bars go up and down.

"What, it doesn't sound familiar?" She said with a smirk, turning the volume. Craig heard his own voice and guitar coming from the speakers and stared at Ashley.

"Wow, that sounds really good." He said in shock, suprised that she did such a good job.

"Well I had nothing else to do. Hey...do you want to go out sometime? I mean...I miss you." Ashley said, looking him in the eyes. Something inside him felt like soaring upward but then it collided with the image of Alicia that had been burned into his brain recently. The sudden collision of goth and gorgeous almost made him choke. With his voice coming out hoarse, he managed to say,

"I actually can't do that. I'll get back to you though." Craig responded grabbing his bag and walking away so that he wouldn't have to be in the room with Ashley anymore. Him and Ashley had broken up recently and Craig wasn't sure he wanted to go back down that road, and Alicia seemed so amazing. A smile came to his face when he remembered that he would be meeting her later at Billy's. The rest of the day went by relatively quickly for Craig, and meeting Alicia was like fuel to his over-exhausted brain. He ate lunch that day with Marco and discussed his band, and decided to have a practice the coming weekend.

After school he went back into the computer lab and checked for Ashley. When he was sure she wasn't around he sat down adn began to write a song. he had some time to kill and he needed to keep himself busy. It wasn't long before Craig found himself lost in the music once again. The lyrics flowed through him as easily as the blood through his veins and he smiled as his fingers flew across the keyboard at what seemed like lightning speed. A giggling Emma and Manny shocked him back to his senses.

"You might want to wipe the drool of of your chin before you get electrocuted." Emma said laughing, and sitting down at a computer to work on whatever activist paper she was working on at that particular moment. Manny just stared at Craig and smiled, Craig eyed Manny seeing a pink lace thong showing over the top of come low rise jeans and shook his head focusing on the screen.

"It's okay to look." She said, smiling at him. He just turned bright red and stared at the screen so hard that he could see the individual color bars that made up the display. All he could think to himself was "three more hours...three more hours..."


End file.
